


Out in All That Sunshine

by thornfield_girl



Series: Somehow, Someday [7]
Category: Justified
Genre: Domestic, Hillbilly Culture, M/M, Vacation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-22
Updated: 2012-10-22
Packaged: 2017-11-16 19:16:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,426
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/542923
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thornfield_girl/pseuds/thornfield_girl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Raylan and Boyd take their son to Gatlinburg. Boyd is grumpy. Raylan is amused.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Out in All That Sunshine

**Author's Note:**

> This was written on basically a dare, while on vacation in this very same place. All of the details are ripped directly from my actual experience. I have pictures, just ask. ;)

"A time share. In Gatlinburg, Tennessee." 

Boyd looked up at Raylan in the bathroom mirror as he rinsed his toothbrush, then set it down and turned around.

"That's right," Raylan said, nodding. "For free. Art called me up outta the blue to offer it to me, said it was an anniversary gift. His wife wants to stay with their daughter in California over their vacation, so he ain't using it." 

Raylan was blatantly ignoring Boyd's sour expression. He'd known it wasn't going to go over well when Art had offered it, but there was no way they could afford anything like this on their own. This was a fact Boyd knew perfectly well, but Raylan reminded him anyway.

"You really want to just do another weekend in Ocean City this year, instead of taking a free week at a really nice resort in the Smokies? 'Cause that's the alternative, you know that."

They went into the bedroom and started straightening out the covers on the unmade bed. Raylan could think of only one time either of them had made the bed, and that had been years before, the first time Ava came to visit. Usually they just shut the door when they had company.

Boyd rolled his eyes. "Raylan," he said, mock-patiently, "We have our very own house in the beautiful Appalachian mountains, where we can see family and friends, and where the stares we will inevitably get will at least be from people we've known our whole goddamn lives, rather than a bunch of unfamiliar rednecks."

Boyd got into bed and laid down under the sheet. Raylan crawled in next to him and gave a snort.

"Honestly, when was the last time you gave a shit about being stared at? And you know Andrew doesn't care. He thinks it's hilarious. Remember when we were at that bluegrass festival out in western Maryland and he kept trying to get us to kiss?"

Boyd looked like he was trying very hard to fight down a smile at that, but in the end was unsuccessful. 

"And look," Raylan pressed on, "We can spend a week there, then drive to Harlan and stay for a week. Come on."

Boyd was still looking mutinous, but Raylan could tell he'd won this battle. 

"And," Raylan pressed on, suppressing a laugh, "we can go to Dollywood."

"Dollywood," Boyd muttered, "Dear lord."

"Now, how can you resist the many charms of the beautiful Miss Dolly Parton."

"Raylan, I like Dolly and her lovely voice, and her big titties, and her goddamn wigs as much as the next person. She comes from a holler, just like you and me, and I don't begrudge her a thing. But that don't mean I have to approve of that particular brand of smirking, condescending, bullsh-"

Raylan put a hand on his arm. "Boyd."

"What?"

"It's a fucking theme park. Jesus Christ, lighten up."

Boyd sighed. "All right. Fine. But you owe me, Raylan Givens, I swear to God."

Raylan smirked. "I hate owing you. How 'bout I just pay up now?" He straddled Boyd's legs and started tugging at his sleep pants.

"Raylan," Boyd laughed, "It don't count if it's something you already love as much as I know you love sucking my dick."

"Hmm," Raylan said. "I do love it, that's true." He finished pulling the pants over Boyd's ankles and tossed them on the floor. "I guess I'll have to think of something else." He stretched himself out along the length of Boyd's body and kissed him.

"Don't you worry, I already got something in mind." With that, he reached for Raylan, and they both stopped talking for awhile. 

As it turned out what he had in mind was forcing Raylan to read a book of his choosing so they could talk about it on the way down. People at work were giving him funny looks for weeks, as none of them had ever, in his nearly six years at the Baltimore field office, seen him reading for pleasure. Not that this could be strictly considered as such, but since he felt the reality was far more humiliating than the perception, he let it lie.

Boyd had assigned - and there was no other word for it - assigned him a book called _Child of God_ , by Cormac McCarthy. In what was obviously not a coincidence, it was set in Sevier County, Tennessee, which was where they were headed. It wasn't exactly a tourist guide.

They got on the road early on a Sunday morning. Raylan carried a half-asleep 7 year old Andrew to the car, and they stopped for coffee on the way out of town. 

Neither of them did much talking for the first couple of hours. Raylan felt grateful, as he had on several occasions in the past, that they were well-matched in that way. He was  
certain he couldn't live with a morning person for long.

At around the three hour mark, they stopped for some food, Boyd took over the driving, and Raylan said, "That might have been the most disturbing book I have ever read."

Boyd grinned and replied, "If you read more books, that would carry more weight, Raylan. But you're right, it is disturbing. I knew you'd like it."

"Think we're gonna run into many necrophiliac hillbilly serial killers on this vacation?"

"Well," Boyd said, patting Raylan on the leg, "It is Tennessee, so it wouldn't hurt to be on the lookout."

 

They got to the resort at around five, and Boyd was already glancing around with sharp eyes. The place looked okay to Raylan - three story buildings of faux log cabin construction, a couple pools, a small indoor water park, clean, and set right in the side of the mountain. It was pretty. 

They parked and Raylan went to check them in. He came back twenty minutes later, and they followed a hefty, bleached- blonde woman in a golf cart a little ways up the steeply-pitched parking lot. 

When Boyd and Andrew got out, the lady missed maybe half a beat before gamely continuing with her spiel about what a nice unit they were in, and how she was gonna take good care of them, and all they had to do was call. And of course, they were invited to take a timeshare tour if they'd like some free water park passes. Raylan pushed down a grin and raised his eyebrows at Boyd, who glared back at him.

Their first full day at the resort, they went to the water park. They took turns going on the slides with Andrew, and although Boyd rolled his eyes a few times at the folksy bullshit, he mostly kept it to himself. Raylan knew he wanted the kid to have a good time, and it was fun watching them. 

They both knew this was not a great venue for any kind of outward displays of affection between the two of them, but at one point as they were handing Andrew off, Raylan gave Boyd a pointed smile and said quietly, "Let's see if we can get him to bed early tonight." 

Boyd chuckled in response. He said to Andrew, "Come on, boy, let's see how many times we can do that slide in the next hour," and winked. Raylan grinned, watching them run off. 

They went into downtown Gatlinburg the next day, and Boyd still managed to keep his horror mostly under wraps, though it was obvious he was struggling a bit when they reached Old Smokey's Tennessee Moonshine Holler, where a sign proudly proclaimed them to be the first "legal moonshine" in the state of Tennessee. 

Raylan knew he should just pull them past that whole business, in the interest of domestic tranquility, but his love of seeing Boyd pissed off won out. 

He wandered into the little alcove, where a man in a full-on Beverly Hillbillies get-up was playing the fiddle. He was pretty good, too, which kind of made the humiliation factor worse. Raylan had been pretending not to be bothered by any of this shit, playing off Boyd's righteous indignation, but he had to admit, it grated a bit. 

The "moonshine" store was full of moonshine-related foods, t-shirts (Raylan suggested they buy one for Ava that was hot pink and said, "High Class, My Ass" on the front, and Boyd looked at him like he'd asked for a punch in the face), shot glasses, and the ultimate insult: a Mason jar in a box that sold for $11.

"Now, I ask you, Raylan," Boyd was saying as they walked through a doorway to the area where the booze was sold, "What kind of damn fool, ignorant Yankee would you have to be, to-" He cut himself off as he watched an obese man with a bushy beard and a Harley shirt, accompanied by his equally obese wife, holding one of the boxes up and yukking it up. They then proceeded to the check out with arms loaded down with overpriced crap, including the shirt Raylan had mentioned - albeit in size XXL - and one of the jars.

"Well," Boyd grumbled. "I stand corrected on the Yankee part. How fucking disappointing."

They had lunch and bought some cheap souvenirs and postcards, then headed back to spend time at the pool.

The following day they went on a long hike in the National Park, and Boyd was in a fantastic mood, even though they ended up having to take turns giving Andrew piggyback rides for half of it. They went out for a chicken dinner after, and there was almost no muttering involved the entire time. 

They sat out on the deck after the boy was in bed, drinking bourbon and not talking much, and they after a time, they went in and fucked. It was almost a perfect day, one which Raylan hoped Boyd would keep in mind while they were spending the entire next day at the dreaded Dollywood.

They entered the park, passing several shops and a little bandstand where a little bluegrass group was playing. They walked past Dolly’s old tour bus. Raylan got a rather evil grin on his face and said, “Should we go inside and take a look?”

Boyd smirked and said, “Why yes, Raylan. Let’s do that. Let’s you and me take our seven year old son to look at Dolly Parton’s goddamn pink tour bus. Jesus Christ, they’d probably call child services on us for that, around here.” They moved on. 

They wandered through the shady park, past the old-timey craft stands and demonstrations, to a firefighter- themed ride. When the ride conductor instructed everyone on the ride to shout, "Fire in the hole!" Raylan didn't even try to pretend he wasn't cracking up. Boyd was in the seat behind them, so there was no way he didn't see it, but Raylan didn't look back to catch his reaction. 

They rode through burning hollers with animatronic hillbillies, shouting at each other with Hee Haw accents, and finally emerged into the sunlight after what felt much longer than the three minutes it actually took.

"Raylan, are you seriously telling me that you think this is just fine? Dear god, just imagine if someone made an inner city ghetto themed amusement park. Someone should tell fuckin' David Simon. They could call it Wire World, and you could have a ride called High Rise Elevator, where it breaks down halfway and animatronic junkies accost you. There could be bumper cars that ride past all the drug corners. They-"

"Enough! I get it. I understand what you're saying, and I don't entirely disagree, but it's still a nice park with decent rides, and maybe we should just make the best of it. It's not for us, you know."

"Yeah, yeah. Okay. Sorry. Where to next?"

"I think the Tennessee Tornado, and then the Mystery Mine." Raylan held himself back from wincing at that one, and Boyd just looked at him.

"I won't ask you to tell me that's not what I think it is, because I never want you to lie to me, Raylan."

"You know me, darlin'. Nothing I like better than making light of coal mining." Raylan grinned ruefully at him, and Boyd sighed. 

Raylan came out of the mine coaster with a sore neck, but Boyd seemed to enjoy it more than he'd expected. He did draw the line at buying a souvenir miner's helmet with headlamp, however. Raylan had a brief vision of buying him the pink one and having him wear it to Ava's house, but $15 seemed like a lot to pay for a two-minute gag.

That night, they were both exhausted, and they lay in bed watching, but not really paying attention to, the news. 

Boyd rolled over and ran his fingers up and down Raylan's chest. "Are you irritated with me?"

"Why?" Raylan said, "Just because you spent the whole day complaining?"

Boyd let his forehead fall onto Raylan's shoulder and nodded.

"Nah. I like it that you care about shit. And you know how I love it when you get your Harlan up." Raylan reached over to put his arm around Boyd. 

"Then how is it you're just laying there instead of putting the moves on me?"

"I'm fucking tired, Boyd. And I'm sick of this place, tell you the truth. You think we could maybe leave for Kentucky a few days early?"

Boyd's face at that moment was a thing of beauty, looking up at Raylan, all full of surprise like it almost never was. Then he grabbed Raylan's face and planted a firm kiss squarely on his mouth. He pulled back a little and said, "Do you have any idea how much I love you, Raylan?"

Raylan looked at him for a moment, like he was thinking about it, then said, "I _think_ I might... but you know, I always say, actions speak louder than words."

That night, Raylan felt like Boyd was shouting it at him. The next morning, they packed up as quick as they could and hightailed it to Harlan without a backward glance. As they drove out of the resort, Boyd turned to him and said, “Thank you, Raylan.”

Raylan figured it was okay if Boyd kept thinking he was doing him a favor, so he didn’t bother to correct him. He thought it was ironic how much he was looking forward to getting to Harlan, considering it was the only other place he’d ever been this anxious to leave.

Raylan looked at him and grinned. “Anything for you, darlin’.”


End file.
